Sparks
by miss-motormouth
Summary: Angel realises what he knew all along.
1. Part 1

Title: Sparks  
  
Category: Buffy/Angel, Angel POV  
  
Rating: PG 13  
  
Summary: Angel realises what he always knew.  
  
Timeline/Spoilers: Spoilers for season 3 of Angel in a vague way. Set sometime in the future, Angel's human, a few years on from the current seasons.  
  
Disclaimer: Nope the characters aren't mine. Belong to Joss and co. Witness the non bitchy disclaimer here. I'm proud, this has to be a first for me :)  
  
Feedback: Of course I want feedback. Would love it, treasure it, adore it. It would make my day so drop me a quick line to let me know if you liked or post a review if you're reading this at ff.net. pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk  
  
Distribution: Fanfiction.net, Wild Horses, SU, B/A lists, anywhere else sure take it just ask first.  
  
  
  
Sparks  
  
  
  
Emotions lie within you, buried and dormant. You think they're gone, that the spark has faded. And then the memories resurface and you realise it wasn't a spark, it was the fire and it never faded. It's still burning the exact same way it did when you were with her. You knew it all along but you never admitted it to yourself.  
  
And now it's too late. I used to have forever, I was never worried about it being too late. There were hundreds of years of time ahead of me. Plenty time to figure things out. Now it's different, I'm human and it's brutally obvious that I don't have forever. I'm told that fifty, sixty years it's a long time to live but it used to be a mere heartbeat to me. I'm also told that dwelling on the past is bad for you. But the past is all I have to dwell on. The past is the best part of my life. My lives. As Liam, Angelus, Angel, then Angelus again, and then Angel once more and finally as human. Strange that the best part of my life was as a vampire.  
  
This new human life, there are sensations that I never experienced before and things I could never do before but nothing now is as vivid or real as the memories I have. Those three years of my life spent with her and the day we shared, everything pales in comparison. I've finally realised that moving on isn't going to happen. Not that I didn't try. Darla, Cordelia, they mattered and I think I loved them in a sense but it wasn't the same. With Darla there was never the tenderness and with Cordy I missed the way things used to be with us, the friendship we had shared. It didn't work out. It's not supposed to be the same is it? Relationships are supposed to be different. If I had ever wanted something, *someone* different then that would be okay, the thing is I don't. I only want her. There were other women here and there but like I said, it all pales. It's not fair to be with someone when you'd rather be with someone else so maybe that's why I'm alone right now. I don't mind it, I've been alone for years on end before but sometimes I miss the warmth. The light. Last time I was alone there'd never been a light to miss.  
  
I was the one who told her to move on, that we had to move on. I said it and I thought I meant it. I thought we could. Of course I didn't mean the words I spoke, I thought she would understand that goodbye didn't mean goodbye. Which was stupid because goodbye was what I said, what else was she supposed to think it meant? I didn't mean it the last time I saw her either.  
  
It was in LA and I was walking in the sunlight, I never get tired of that and I saw her. I remembered the last time I saw her in the sun and I stopped. She saw me the same instant I saw her and our eyes met. Her hair was longer than the last time I saw it, long and golden, waving a little in the slight breeze that had tickled Los Angeles that day. She was wearing a cream coloured dress that clung to her curves and carrying a few shopping bags. We just looked at each other, sometimes that was all we needed to do. Then a child tugged on her hand from behind. A little girl with tousled and tangled brown hair and tanned skin. Something tugged at my insides then. Buffy's eyes locked onto mine for a second and there was a kind of pain in them. Some pedestrians rushed past them like smoke plumes blowing across the sky and the next time I looked they were gone. I caught a flash of gold in the crowds as Buffy hurried the child along. That was all but the word goodbye was painfully etched on my memory. Her child, her new life and she looked healthy, happy. It should have been goodbye. We had never needed words to say that, the words always cut too deep anyway.  
  
I should have forgotten about her after that, really moved on. She had. But the spark was still there, the fire. Not a fire but *the* fire. It doesn't go out, not ever. That's why I'm parked outside a small terraced house near Pasadena with a blue door. I tell myself it's just to see her again, check she's doing alright but I know I'm not going to say goodbye again. 


	2. Part 2

Title: Sparks Part 2  
  
Category: Buffy/Angel, Buffy POV  
  
Rating: PG 13  
  
Summary: Angel realises what he always knew.  
  
Timeline/Spoilers: Spoilers for season 3 of Angel in a vague way. Set sometime in the future, Angel's human, a few years on from the current seasons. You can find part one at fanfiction.net if you haven't read it. I can't update my stories for a week due to a hardware failure at the site and when I can update them,  
  
Disclaimer: If they were mine then in this story Buffy wouldn't be bitter, Angel wouldn't be suddenly now realising hey I still loves Buffy and so on. Sadly though they're not mine and I'm starting to think the people who own them are smoking crack.  
  
Feedback: Yes, I want feedback. Would love it, treasure it, adore it. Let me know if you liked/want more or post a review if you're reading this at ff.net. pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk  
  
Distribution: Fanfiction.net, Wild Horses, SU, B/A lists, anywhere else sure take it just ask first.  
  
AN: Well you guys wanted another part so I wrote one. Pretty short again. Buffy POV this time and maybe if you want more then I'll write what actually happens, *g*. Thinking of one more part after this, I have a plan for an angsty miserable one and a plan for a kinda angsty but then happy ending one. Not sure which to do, let me know what you think.  
  
Part 2  
  
I think I wanted him to see me. I think I babysat Sophy for Anya and Xander way too much, took her around the whole of LA, because I wanted to see him. Just to look at him and say hey I'm happy now. Screw you, Angel. Ain't it strange I'm still mad at him? It's not the Cordelia thing that made me the angriest, it was the fact he never visited or called or spoke to me at all. As though we were never anything to each other. You'd think we'd have something to say to each other after all this time. Hell, we used to have everything to say to each other. But now, there must be something we could talk about. Like how've you been? Been sleeping with any of my other classmates from High School recently? Me? Well I slept with Spike.  
  
Something like that.  
  
I didn't count on actually running into him. I thought about it and I imagined it but I didn't think it would really happen. And then a couple of weeks ago it did. I saw him in the street and it wasn't anything like I'd pictured it. I stopped because I couldn't breathe. He looked at me and then at Sophy and in all my imaginings I hadn't pictured the look on his face. I felt guilty. Terrible. It wasn't as though I lied to him or anything. He just jumped to the obvious conclusion - but you see, I think I wanted him to jump to conclusions. I wanted him to look shattered and he did and it was nothing like the victory I'd imagined.  
  
I probably looked shattered too. That's how I felt. Oh how I should have left things alone. The past is the past and it's over but I had to interfere and now things are...confusing. I knew he would come. That sixth sense I used to have about where Angel was, how I could always sense him - turns out I still have it. He took his time in coming but eventually he did. I wonder if he's going to come in or just sit out there in that car and wait for something. The kind of something I wasted my time waiting for. That something that's never going to happen.  
  
I wonder if I should go out there and yell at him. Ask him what the hell he's doing here. Tell him to leave me alone. Or if I should say hi and invite him in like it's no big deal. Or act surprised like I didn't even know he was in LA. God I don't know, what I do know is that suddenly the past has hit me hard in the face and it hurts.  
  
Most importantly I wonder why I care so much. I thought I'd stopped caring about him long ago. I was wrong. I do care even though I'd rather not. That's why I wanted him to see I was doing alright on my own, yell at him for all the things I wanted him to do, because I care. Why else would what he thinks and does bother me? So I care. It's not that big a deal. It makes sense that I care. He was the love of my life, my soulmate and all that bullshit.  
  
Oh I never used to think it was bullshit. I really believed in it. Things change though and now I can't think of the past without thinking what a fool I was. Back then everything seemed so easy. We were going to live happily ever after in my idyllic sixteen year old vision of the future. I was wrong about that too.  
  
I thought the past was over and done with. Now though, now the past is here and it's not as over as I had thought. Maybe I wanted this but what I'm supposed to do, I don't know. I sit down at my kitchen table and I want to call someone. Angel was the person I used to call, long ago, when these strange things happened. I hear a noise outside and I know he's opening the door of the car. I don't move.  
  
Tbc?  
  
Pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk 


	3. Part 3

Title: Sparks 3/?  
  
Author: Emily (check out my site collective at: http://destined.to/blinded )  
  
Category: Buffy/Angel, Angel POV  
  
Rating: PG 13  
  
Summary: Angel realises what he always knew.  
  
Timeline/Spoilers: Spoilers for season 3 of Angel in a vague way. Set sometime in the future, Angel's human, a few years on from the current seasons. You can find parts one and two at fanfiction.net if you haven't read it.  
  
Disclaimer: If they were mine then I wouldn't even have to write this story. Blame Joss/Marti/Zombies or whoever you want for the C/A of AtS last season. Me, I wouldn't have put that on TV *g*.  
  
Feedback: I'm a feedback ho. Yes. Pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk  
  
Distribution: Fanfiction.net, B/A lists, Blinded by the Light if I ever put my fic up instead of using links to ffnet. Anywhere else that wants to archive just let me know where it's going up and take the other parts too.  
  
Dedication: To Paris for the feedback - and then for the mucho bitching over what's happened recently on the shows, 'cause that was fun :D. Drop me a line sometime, chica and I hope you enjoy this part :)  
  
AN: Yes I want to know what you think, if you liked, what you'd like to see happen next (and I promise I'll listen even if I don't do it ;) ) and how you'd like it to turn out. I don't know if this fic will have a happy ending like Sweet Misery will. At the moment I'm leaning towards misery and angst.  
  
~~**Sparks**~~  
  
Part 3  
  
I open the car door and that's a start. Then I close it. I really don't know what I'm going to say or what the point to this is. I need to see her. But Buffy, Buffy probably doesn't want to see me and I don't blame her. I open the door again, decisively and step out the car.  
  
It's a pretty neighbourhood. You'd never know you were in LA until you drive back on to the freeway. The house is small and shaded by a couple of trees. Two storeys. There are flowers twining wistfully up the south facing wall. White, delicate and a few fallen petals are on the ground. I bend down and pick a couple of them up. They're a little wilted but still pure white. All of a sudden this sadness creeps over me. I can't explain it but there's something about this place that touches me deep within. Maybe it's because she's here, she made this and it's beautiful and yet infinitely sad. I wonder if she's the same way.  
  
There's a sound behind me and the door opens.  
  
" What are you doing here?" The words are soft. Questioning not exactly accusing.  
  
I look up and she's right there. The petals slip from my fingers to rest quietly upon the ground. There's a wariness in her eyes and the accusation she doesn't show in her is voice nestled there too. Her hair is swept back off her shoulders but still long and golden like the last time I saw her and she's just wearing jeans and a pale white tank top that shows a little of her tanned belly.  
  
" Angel?" Buffy questions again.  
  
" Buffy" I say and her lips curve in a faint smile. Not a smile of joy or happiness. Nothing like that. It's almost bitter.  
  
" What are you doing here?" She repeats, the smile fading and anger coming into her eyes.  
  
" I needed to see you."  
  
" Why..." She starts to say and stops. " It doesn't matter why. I don't need to see you, Angel. I haven't needed to see you in the longest time." Buffy states, her words level and her voice almost emotionless.  
  
They cut deep. Deeper than I'd thought possible. And words like that, I never knew Buffy was capable of words like that. I don't bother to try and hide that it hurts. We've known each other too long for that. The longest time. And deeper still.  
  
She lowers her gaze a little after looking at me for a few seconds with those clear relentless eyes. Her teeth scrape across her bottom lip and that's the only sign I have that she feels anything.  
  
" Can I come in?"  
  
Buffy shrugs. " You don't have to ask anymore, do you? If you want." She says and holds the door open as I follow her in.  
  
She leads me into the kitchen and sits down at the table, folding her arms across her chest.  
  
" What is it?"  
  
" I wanted to see you again."  
  
" You've seen. You saw me that other time too. You've seen it *all* before, Angel. Why did you have to come here?" She demands.  
  
" That other time...where is she?"  
  
" She?" Buffy looks puzzled.  
  
" Your daughter."  
  
And then she laughs. It's like her smile, bitter. " Not my daughter. Sophy is Anya and Xander's. I was just showing her some of LA"  
  
" Oh" I say, feeling a strange kind of relief wash over me.  
  
" You came to check if she was mine?" Buffy asks slowly. " She's not. I'm not married or in a relationship. I live in a house by myself. Alone. Happy?"  
  
" Buffy that doesn't make me happy." I tell her, shocked at these words. " I didn't come here to see that you weren't or that you were. I...I want you to be happy."  
  
" So you barge into my life? What you said, those years ago in LA when I came to see you, you were right. We don't live in each others worlds. We may both live in LA but your world - " She shakes her head. " It's nothing like mine. They haven't been the same for years and you turning up won't make them."  
  
And that, that's true. Much as I want it not to be, it's true. I love her but Buffy's moved on. Every word that cuts me tells me exactly how she's moved on. How ironic that I imagined I had moved on. Someday I'll have to ask her how she did it. Someday when she doesn't hate me.  
  
I nod slowly. " You're right. Can we just talk?"  
  
" About what? Us? You? Cordelia?"  
  
I look at her in surprise. " How do you know about Cordelia?"  
  
" Anya sometimes talks to Cordelia. I talk to Anya. I asked her about you."  
  
And maybe she cared back then. She must have cared then. She asked about me. Me...I never asked about her. I tried not to think about her, to forget. Move the hell on.  
  
And didn't that work out well?  
  
" It was just a thing. I thought I loved her." I say, like saying that will make anything at all right.  
  
" Spare me the details." She mutters.  
  
" What about you?"  
  
" You're asking about me now? In the sense that you actually care? I fucked Spike. He fell in love with me and I screwed him over. In all the senses of the word." Buffy tells me, not looking away this time. Her eyes are relentless on mine but not as cold before and her lips, her lips tremble once before she purses them together.  
  
Buffy. My Buffy, with *Spike*. It's too much to be real. I can't say anything. And yet, I can't help but wonder if at the time when I've been wrapped in the arms of Cordelia, if then it would have mattered like it matters now. Or if it would have been a short sharp shock and then nothing because I had Cordelia who was beautiful and sweet and funny and what fucking else was there?  
  
" Does it hurt?" She asks suddenly. Still looking at me.  
  
" It hurts."  
  
She nods a little, not looking satisfied or happy or proud or even bitter. I don't recognise the look but it's raw.  
  
" Did it hurt for you before?" I ask. Just a little from her. Just to know that I mattered. That once I mattered, once long ago before I fucked everything up. Just a little.  
  
" It does. It hurts." She says and the words are honest even if her eyes aren't meeting mine anymore.  
  
* * *  
  
tbc...and yeah definitely this time :) I'll love you forever if you feedback - pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk 


	4. Part 4

Title: Sparks 4/?  
  
Author: Emily  
  
Category: Buffy/Angel, Buffy POV  
  
Rating: PG 13  
  
Summary: Angel realises what he always knew.  
  
Timeline/Spoilers: Spoilers for season 3 of Angel in a vague way. Set sometime in the future, Angel's human, a few years on from the current seasons. You can find the earlier parts at fanfiction.net if you haven't read it.  
  
Disclaimer: God I don't want them these days. Look how they turned out in this fic! All bitter and scarred. Joss can keep them if he's not going to make things right. CtS and BtVL belong to Marti and Greenwalt. Sue them. Um yeah I'm all bitter and scarred too, lol, can you tell? :) Oh and screw fanfiction.net who got rid of NC 17 stories. Damn them too.  
  
Feedback: I'm a feedback ho. Yes. Pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk  
  
Distribution: Fanfiction.net, B/A lists, Blinded by the Light if I ever put my fic up instead of using links to ffnet. Anywhere else that wants to archive just let me know where it's going up and take the other parts too.  
  
Dedication: Everyone who's reading this story and suffering with the month long breaks between parts *g*, I wish I could get them out faster.  
  
Sparks  
  
Part 4  
  
It hurts, I didn't even realise that till now, that it *still* hurts. It still hurts, I still care and oh God I just don't know. Suddenly I'm not so sure about all the things that I knew yesterday. Basically I'm screwed.  
  
"Now?" Angel asks, echoing my thoughts.  
  
I nod and look at the table. I don't want to analyse exactly how and why and all the little ways that it hurts. Not right now, not ever.  
  
" Is that all?" I demand, feeling vulnerable. Like he could just touch my hand and know everything that I've kept locked away, not even admitting any of it to myself.  
  
I know it's not all. I know he has a thousand other tearing questions. This isn't all, but how I wish it could be enough for him. That he could go now and leave me here to cry.  
  
" Buffy, you're okay?" He asks. Break my world apart just to see if I'm okay. Leave me a wreck. I know this. We've done this before. Oh we've done it all before and it still doesn't stop hurting.  
  
" What are you doing now?" Angel asks suddenly like this is some lame high school reunion. It's a reunion and he's the ex vampire that I used to be head over heels in love with and now we're here, awkward and bitter and wasn't high school just as fucked up?  
  
" Could you not try to make small talk with me?" I ask quietly. " I can't talk to you about what I'm doing with my life, or the weather or the latest Julia Roberts movie. Angel, I just can't."  
  
I didn't mean to sound so desperate but I am. I'm desperate for him to leave and let me be. I can't cope with this. I've been coping with a thousand other things, alone, for years but it turns out that the one thing that's breaking me up is Angel. Ironic, considering what I'd been through with him was probably the only reason I managed to cope with everything else. Anything but this.  
  
I suppose some things never change. I can hate him and he can screw Cordelia but he's still the only one that affects me this much.  
  
" What do you want to talk about?" He persists, in that oh so sensitive way of his. That way he used when he looked at me and said he didn't want his life to be with me. I wanted him to cry, to yell, to make up more reasons why not, I wanted him to kiss me goodbye, to hold me again, to say he loved me and he felt the same but we couldn't. I never wanted him to look at me and tell me that he didn't want to be with me. I would never have asked for that. And even that didn't stop me loving him.  
  
" I don't" I say flatly and he flinches and I wonder if I'm breaking his heart a little, God knows he broke mine enough. "Please just go"  
  
He stares at me. " You don't mean that."  
  
" I mean it." I say and stand up. He stands too. "I want you to go and get the hell out of my life."  
  
He still looks at me in that goddamned way of his and then my arm is swinging hard at his face. I watch as my fist hits him like I'm someone else just watching a play that should be over by now. Long over. I vaguely remember the feeling of my hand trying to bruise him from a long time ago and so I hit him again. Try to grasp it. I was bitter then. Bitter and angry and hurt and yet it wasn't half as awful as now.  
  
I hit him once more and then finally he's grabbing me, rough and tearing hands on my shoulders, slamming me against the wall. I grasp this now. A little. He keeps on shaking me and I close my eyes even though I know that darkness is going to be a long time coming. He's *warm* and there won't be any fangs sinking into my neck nor any kind of escape from this. I can't escape from whatever we've become. He can't either and he's *holding* me and I suddenly can't breathe.  
  
My eyes are still closed. Doesn't feel like I've really opened them in forever. They're closed and then - of all the things he's kissing me. Hard lips bruising mine. Not the soft tender - *careful* - kisses we used to share. Not at all. His mouth is angry and demanding against mine - and I want him. I hate myself for it, I hate myself for my tongue tangling wildly against his, I hate myself for *still* wanting him after all these years, oh and I can hate myself all I want but it won't do a thing to help. It won't help because I'm in his arms again and I'm kissing him back like he's the only person in the world.  
  
* * *  
  
tbc :)  
  
feedback? Pipergal33@yahoo.co.uk 


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